Tire Company buys 40% of The Wine Advocate

I mean, I guess good for them?

Ever eat at a 3 star tire company restaurant?

The subject line was meant to be a little tongue-in-cheek…

The way the TWA worded their version of the release, it sounds like they actually raised new equity vs. Michelin buying existing shares…which is interesting.

Also wonder if this deal getting inked prompted Jeb to head for the hills.

“notes of burnt rubber and roadkill”

This has super interesting written all over it. This may be the smartest thing they’ve ever done.

This was a way to raise capital while aligning the pub with high-lux branding. Makes sense. I suppose LVMH was out so this is next best.

One hundred point restaurant scale, here we come!

This deal probably cost Michelin several hundred dollars!

This is part & parcel of a really ugly phenomenon laying waste to the entire world today.

I was reading an article this morning about how people in Europe can’t afford to live in their hometowns anymore:

Bye-bye locals: Europe’s city centres sound alarm
http://www.france24.com/en/20170705-bye-bye-locals-europes-city-centres-sound-alarm

With the central banksters’ monetization of everything, there’s so much fake money floating around in the system that if you don’t have direct access to The Source, then you’re nothing more than an ant which is about to be squished beneath the boot of Global Finance.

And the result which you see in contemporary economic dynamical systems is a binary outcome space which consists of quickly achieving monopolization status in some sustainable niche, or rapidly disappearing into bankruptcy.

So either Robert Parker Inc hitches its star to a well-financed globalist entity, like Michelin, or Robert Parker Inc is washed out to sea by Cellar Tracker & Snooth & Yelp & AirBNB & Open Table & whatnot.

In fact, I’d guess that the new Open Table [with its verified-diner rating system of restaurants] poses a severe threat to Michelin’s travel & dining interests.

Note that Open Table is now a subsidiary of Priceline, and even Michelin might not have enough money to bag Priceline.

BTW, has anyone looked at Chow Hound recently?

It’s a wasteland.

Fake money has decimated the very concept of cottage industry.

Nathan - Michelin doesn’t have nearly enough money to bag Priceline. More likely the other way around. Priceline’s market cap is around 90 billion, Michelin’s is about a fifth of that.

I don’t know Neal - if the WA were a successful operation with positive cash flow, why would it need to raise capital?

Alternatively, this is was a way for the Singapore investors to cut some of their losses. The release doesn’t say how much Parker had to say about it, whether he even comes along as part of the package and if so, for how long, or whether he is still physically up to reviewing much wine. He’s backed off from his main areas and isn’t in great health from some reports.

Now take your index finger and point it at something which Priceline produces.

It’s utter insanity.

Here’s a screenshot of Priceline’s monetizations:
priceline_MONETIZATIONS.png
And here’s a screenshot of Trip Advisor’s monetizations:
trip-advisor_MONETIZATIONS.png
Normal folks can’t play this game.

It’s the exclusive province of globalists with access to Fake Money.

There have been some really good articles lately about how the airlines are now themselves simply players in Global Monetization Inc, e.g.:
Airlines make more money selling miles than seats
Airlines make more money selling miles than seats

It turns out that the scam involves forcing the Cottage Industrialists [the hotels & motels & BnBs & restaurants & wine shops & whatnot] to eat 6 points or more on credit card transactions, with the wolves getting 4 or 5 points of that, and the airlines getting one or two points, which they then convert into a new Fake Currency called “Frequent Flyer Miles”.

And the idiot consumeristic sheep think they’re getting Free Shit when in fact everyone is now paying an extra six points or more to subsidize these new Fake Currencies [with the ostensibly prudent & penurious, who pay in cash, getting hit the hardest].

It’s all just Monetization upon Monetization upon Monetization, fueled by the never-ending creation of Fake Money, courtesy of your friendly neighborhood Central Banksters.

When did RP start is own K-Pop group?

:stuck_out_tongue: :stuck_out_tongue:

“The power of the ratings given to fine wines are based on the noses and palates of the passionate wine critic and his team of experts, but also on a methodology that is unique in this field.

Hmm. If you say so.

But Nathan - I don’t think this has anything to do with fake money. It’s just a company getting scammed by another. Forty percent non-controlling interest in a one-man shop where the proprietor is heading out the door for good?

And there is a solution to your money issues - block chain technology! Look at the market cap of Bitcoin or Ethereum.

The WA cognoscenti have a proprietary 100 pt scale, that no one else has figured out yet.

Sure people talk about 110 pts and other such pie in the sky ideas.

But like the 4 minute mile, and the self scooping dog, such dreams are beyond todays systems.

Perhaps Michelin thinks they can apply the 100 pt technology to their legacy star ratings technology.

A strategic deal as great as Packard + Studebaker, or Packard + Compaq.

Michelin does have a pretty strict methodology, and they don’t give out a lot of three-star ratings. You wonder if they imagine imposing some discipline on Parker et al. – a strict set of rules for awarding points for different components of a wine, multiple tastings of the same wine on different occasions and a rationing of top rankings… [shock.gif]

I have no clue about the economics of this deal, but there are many reasons to do a deal like this. Most likely previous investors and insiders saw an opportunity to cash out and took it. Something any wise owner of a small business likes to do.

The combination of these two brands makes total sense to me. They are both publishers and distributors of information/opinion on luxury products with huge overlap. In biz parlance this is called adjacency. Michelin’s tire biz is clearly not relevant.

This thread is spinning it’s wheels. I’m tired of it.